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Comment by Ekaros | Hacker News Reader

Seems like failure in choosing cooling solutions. These high-end chips have obscene cooling needs. My guess would be using something that was not designed for TDP in question.

Sufficient cooler, with sufficient airflow is always needed.

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For what it's worth, I have an i9-13900K paired with the largest air cooler available at the time (a be quiet! Dark Rock 5 IIRC), and it's incapable of sufficiently cooling that CPU.

The 13900k draws more than 200W initially and thermal throttles after a minute at most, even in an air conditioned room.

I don't think that thermal problems should be pushed to end user to this degree.

This means your system doesn't have enough airflow if it throttles this quickly.

But I agree this should not be a problem in the first place.

The "Dark Rock 5" marketing materials say it provides a 210 W TDP [1] and marketers seldom under-sell their products' capabilities.

So if your CPU is drawing "more than 200W" you're pretty much at the limits of your cooler.

[1] https://www.bequiet.com/en/cpucooler/5110

Feels like CPU manufacturers should be at least slapping a big warning on if they're selling a CPU that draws more power than any available cooler can dissipate.

In hindsight, I would have gone for an AMD deskop replacement laptop instead of the Dell Intel-based gaming laptop that I purchased last year. The CPU is the best the Raptor Lake line has to offer in mobile format (i7-13900hx) but there is no conceivable way for the laptop, ast thick as it is, to cool it beyond very bursty workloads.

This affects the laptop with other issues, like severe thermal throttling both in CPU and GPU.

A utility like throttlestop allows me to place maximums on power usage so I don't hit the tjMax during regular use. That is around 65-70W for the CPU - which can burst to 200+W in its allowed "Performance" mode. Absolutely nuts.

The idea is that it's for a limited time, after a period of lower-than-that cooling. In other words TDP is time-weighted.

CPU TDP means nothing now. a 65W tdp cpu can easily consume over 100w during boost.

Agree. Also, use good thermal paste. 100 °C is not safe or sustainable long term. Unfortunately, I think the manufacturer's specifications regarding the maximum temperature are misleading. With proper cooling, however, you'll be well within that limit.

No, those processors clock or shut down if too hot. In no circumstances should they fail because of insufficient cooling. Even without airflow etc.

A badly optimized CPU will take excessive amounts of power. The "failure in choosing cooling solutions" excuse is just the pot calling the kettle black.

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